Thursday, August 13, 2009

I love Noro yarns! Kureyon is one of my favorites. I love it's unpredictable color combinations, how it looks and feels only slightly processed, more like a handspun than a commercial yarn.

When I first joined the online knitting forum, Ravelry, I discovered the Noro lovers group and a treasury of Noro patterns. I chose a hat pattern, knit it quickly on a wintery weekend.

After I tried it on it was clear this Noro hat belonged to someone youthful---like someone that snowboards.

August 13,2009. Back at work on my embroidered buttons. Inspired by the Noro yarns again, knitting samples that require buttons for display purposes and for using up yarn purposes. I've returned to that snowboarder's hat, thinking, how would it look as a cowl, a neck-warmer that needs buttons? I pull out my stash of Noro yarns, I swatch, I calculate and I cast on. I knit away, shaping with short rows, fiddling with button holes until I've bound off and have a finished cowl/neck-warmer. I select a few buttons at random, pin them on and head to the bathroom mirror.Hmmm. I find that I have knit a cowl for your average sumo wrestler. Though I swatch, I forget to measure during the knitting part (it's over so quickly)! The cowl thingie is not entirely a bad experience, because as I was pulling it over my unruly non-hat hair, I discover it looks better as the beginnings of hat. The wheels turn.

It's now becoming a hat. I'll revise the calculations for the sumo cowl and will knit another one in a regular person size. Now I'm focused on the transformation of sumo cowl into a hat. I've picked up stitches and I'm heading towards the hat's crown.

This is often how the best things come about for me---enthusiasm/disaster/resurrection. It does remain to be seen though.